A blog about skepticism, atheism and the freedom of not believing in irrational or magical thoughts.
I am not going to use this blog to attack religions, but instead talk about how throwing off the mental shackles of belief has been a freeing experience.

Monday, November 19, 2012

GONK! Gravity Always Wins

You know what argument makes my blood boil?

"It's just a theory."

It isn't even an argument It's an excuse. Worse it also shows how fundamentally ignorant the person I am talking to is.

Evolution is a Theory. A scientific theory supported by multiple hypotheses, data, observation and yes experiments. We do know what it would take to disprove the Theory of Evolution. Scientists look for those sorts of things all the time, but they have not found them. Not once.

Gravity is also a Theory. We know it works. We know how it is applied and can make observations, collect data and run experiments that confirm the finds and data. We DON'T know WHY it works. We know the more massive an object is the more "gravity" it has. We know that there is a time dilatation effect the further you are removed from gravity. Astrophysics even uses gravity to hypothesize about other things like black holes, extra solar planets and even parallel universes. But Gravity is still "just a theory".

I was explaining this to my two kids today.

I was talking to them about gravity and how it always wins. Gravity can be "just a theory" but if you try jumping out your window. GONK. Gravity wins.
Try floating away. GONK. Gravity wins.

For something that is "just a theory" it has an awful lot of power. Here is the thing, like I said, we still don't know 100% how gravity works.
Our understanding of the mechanics of Evolution is much better. Do we know how it got started? Not that I know. Can we see it working? Every-freaking-day.

So the next time someone says "it's just a theory" I am tempted to say "GONK."